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December 20, 2018, Trial News

AAJ report details 2018’s ‘Worst Corporate Conduct’

Mandy Brown

AAJ has released a research report on the “Worst Corporate Conduct of 2018,” highlighting recent misconduct that has threatened and injured the public. The report details harmful practices—from predatory student lending to climate change denial to investor deception—and follows up on companies that appeared in AAJ’s 2017 corporate misconduct report, describing the empty “non-apologies” many CEOs have offered to try to escape accountability.

AAJ has released a research report on the “Worst Corporate Conduct of 2018,” highlighting recent misconduct that has threatened and injured the public. The report details harmful practices—from predatory student lending to climate change denial to investor deception—and follows up on companies that appeared in AAJ’s 2017 corporate misconduct report, describing the empty “non-apologies” many CEOs have offered to try to escape accountability.

The new report covers the actions of corporations such as Navient, a leading culprit in today’s student loan debt crisis. Despite being the smallest of the major student loan servicers, Navient has received more than three times the number of complaints for deceptive practices. The report also calls out Takata for its failure to replace all its defective air bags in vehicles across the country and General Motors for its resistance to recalling those air bags—which have killed dozens and injured hundreds and continue to endanger tens of millions of motorists daily. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimated that nearly 20 million recalled vehicles were still on the road with faulty Takata air bags as of September 2017.

In addition to emphasizing the number of people who have been endangered by these corporations’ negligent and often reckless conduct, the report also draws attention to institutions that could have stopped misconduct but failed to do so. USA Gymnastics, Michigan State University, and the U.S. Olympic Committee, for example, all knew for decades that physician Larry Nassar was sexually abusing athletes but chose to ignore the problem until the athletes forced them to confront it. As described in the report, when organizations have put profits over safety and allowed harmful conduct to continue, injured people have used the civil justice system to hold corporations accountable.

“This report contains eye-opening details about the shocking misconduct and lack of ethics pervading corporate culture. But the good news is, Americans can rely on civil justice to hold these bad actors accountable and change the way they do business,” said AAJ President Elise Sanguinetti. “When everyday Americans are lied to, abused, or injured, they don’t want a phony apology—they want the ability to exercise their constitutional right to hold unscrupulous corporations to account in court in front of a jury.”